1.

0 ACCIDENT AT POWER PLANT IN CHERNOBYL

1.1 What Happened at Chernobyl, Ukraine (Power Plant)

There are many accidents occur in chemical engineering industry which give a
big impact to the people and surrounding such as the explosion from nuclear power
plant at Fukushima Daiichi. For this report, we will talk about the accident happened in
chemical engineering industry that our group choose the accident happened in the
Chernobyl, Ukraine. The Chernobyl power plant is located in Pripyat, Ukraine, 20km
south of the border with Belarus. The plant began operation between 1978 and 1984
that consisted of four reactors.
 The operators of this power plant ran a test on an electric control system of one of
the reactors that led to the explosion. To be more detail, the combination of basic
engineering deficiencies in the reactor, besides the faulty actions of the operators
make this accident happened. When they wanted to run the test, the safety systems
had been switched off and the reactor was being operated under improper, unstable
conditions, a situation which allowed an uncontrollable power surge to occur. A
course of events resulting in a series of explosions and consequent fires that seriously
damaged the reactor building, totally destroyed the reactor and caused the release of
massive amounts of radioactive materials over a ten-day period.
1.2 When The Accident Happened?

During the course of a safety system test being carried out just before a
routine maintenance outage, Chernobyl was destroyed as a result of a power
transient on 26 April 1986. The accident happened mostly because of the lack of
safety preparations. The operators were not informed and not aware that the test
performed could have brought the reactor into an explosive condition. In addition,
they did not comply with operational procedures

The unit 4 reactor was to be shut down for routine maintenance on 25 April
1986. It was decided to take advantage of this shutdown to determine whether, in
the event of a loss of station power, the slowing turbine could provide enough
electrical power to operate the main core cooling water circulating pumps, until
the diesel emergency power supply became operative. The aim of this test was to
determine whether cooling of the core could continue to be ensured in the event
of a loss of power (adequate coolant circulation following completion of the test
was ensured by arranging power supplies to four of the eight pumps from station
service power; the other four pumps were supplied by unit service power).
Accident timeline will be explained below. The sequence of events which follows
has been compiled following a review of a large number of reports and it
represents what is considered the most likely sequence of events, but there
remain some uncertainties:

APRIL 25

01:06 The scheduled shutdown of the reactor started. Gradual lowering of the
power level began.

03:47 Lowering of reactor power halted at 1600 MW(thermal).

14:00 The emergency core cooling system (ECCS) was isolated (part of the
test procedure) to prevent it from interrupting the test later. The fact
that the ECCS was isolated did not contribute to the accident; however,
had it been available it might have reduced the impact slightly.
The power was due to be lowered further; however, the controller of
the electricity grid in Kiev requested the reactor operator to keep
supplying electricity to enable demand to be met. Consequently, the
reactor power level was maintained at 1600 MWt and the experiment
was delayed. Without this delay, the test would have been conducted
during the day shift.

23:10 Power reduction recommenced.

24:00 Shift change.

APRIL 26

00:05 Power level had been decreased to 720 MWt and continued to be
reduced. Although INSAG-1 stated that operation below 700 MWt was
forbidden, sustained operation of the reactor below this level was not
proscribed.

00:28 With the power level at about 500 MWt, control was transferred from
the local to the automatic regulating system. The operator might have
failed to give the 'hold power at required level' signal or the regulating
system failed to respond to this signal. This led to an unexpected fall in
power, which rapidly dropped to 30 MWt.
00:43:27 Turbogenerator trip signal blocked in accordance with operational and
test procedures. INSAG-1 incorrectly reported this event occurring at
01:23:04 and stated: "This trip would have saved the reactor."
However, it is more likely that disabling this trip only delayed the onset
of the accident by 39 seconds.

01:00 The reactor power had risen to 200 MWt and stabilized. Although the
operators may not have known it, the required operating reactivity
margin (ORM) of 15 rods had been violated. The decision was made to
carry out the turbogenerator rundown tests at a power level of about
200 MWt.

01:03 A standby main circulation pump was switched into the left hand
cooling circuit in order to increase the water flow to the core (part of the
test procedure).

01:07 An additional cooling pump was switched into the right hand cooling
circuit (part of the test procedure). Operation of additional pumps
removed heat from the core more quickly leading to decreased
reactivity, necessitating further absorber rod removal to prevent power
levels falling. The pumps delivered excessive flow to the point where
they exceeded their allowed limits. Increased core flow led to problems
with the level in the steam drum.

01:19 The steam drum level was still near the emergency level. To
compensate, the operator increased feed water flow. This raised the
(approx.)
drum level, but further reduced reactivity to the system. The automatic
control rods went up to the upper tie plate to compensate but further
withdrawal of manual rods was required to maintain the reactivity
balance. System pressure began to fall and, to stabilize pressure, the
steam turbine bypass valve was shut off. Since the operators were
having trouble with the pressure and level control, they deactivated the
automatic trip systems to the steam drum around this time.

01:22:30 Calculations performed after the accident found that the ORM at this
point proved to be equal to eight control rods. Operating policy required
that a minimum ORM of 15 control rods be inserted in the reactor at all
times.
 01:23 Reactor parameters stabilized. The unit shift supervisors considered
that preparations for the tests had been completed and, having
(approx.)
switched on the oscilloscope, gave the order to close the emergency
stop valves.

APRIL 26: THE TEST

01:23:04 Turbine feed valves closed to start turbine coasting. This was the
beginning of the actual test. According to Annex I of INSAG-7, for the
following approximately 30 seconds of rundown of the four coolant
pumps, "the parameters of the unit were controlled, remained within
the limits expected for the operating conditions concerned, and did not
require any intervention on the part of the personnel."

01:23:40 The emergency button (AZ-5) was pressed by the operator. Control
rods started to enter the core, increasing the reactivity at the bottom of
the core.

01:23:43 Power excursion rate emergency protection system signals on; power
exceeded 530 MWt.

01:23:46 Disconnection of the first pair of main circulating pumps (MCPs) being
'run down', followed immediately by disconnection of the second pair.

01:23:47 Sharp reduction in the flow rates of the MCPs not involved in the
rundown test and unreliable readings in the MCPs involved in the test;
sharp increase of pressure in the steam separator drums; sharp
increase in the water level in the steam separator drums.

01:23:48 Restoration of flow rates of MCPs not involved in the rundown test to
values close to the initial ones; restoration of flow rates to 15% below
the initial rate for the MCPs on the left side which were being run down;
restoration of flow rates to 10% below the initial rate for one of the other
MCPs involved in the test and unreliable readings for the other one;
further increase of pressure in the steam separator drums and of water
level in the steam separator drums; triggering of fast acting systems for
dumping of steam to condensers.

01:23:49 Emergency protection signal 'Pressure increase in reactor space

(rupture of a fuel channel)'; 'No voltage - 48 V' signal (no power supply
to the servodrive mechanisms of the EPS); 'Failure of the actuators of
 automatic power controllers Nos 1 and 2' signals.

01:24 From a note in the chief reactor control engineer's operating log:
"01:24: Severe shocks; the RCPS rods stopped moving before they
reached the lower limit stop switches; power switch of clutch
mechanisms is off."

Two explosions were reported, the first being the initial steam explosion, followed
two or three seconds later by a second explosion, possibly from the build-up of
hydrogen due to zirconium-steam reactions. Fuel, moderator, and structural materials
were ejected, starting a number of fires, and the destroyed core was exposed to the
atmosphere. The body of this one worker was never recovered, was killed in the
explosions and a second worker died in hospital a few hours later as a result of
injuries received in the explosions. The reactor was totally destroyed within a few
seconds because of the safety factors that the workers did not comply that provoked a
nuclear accident of maximum severity.

1.3 The Effects From This Accident

 After the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, around 800,000 civil and military personnel
were called upon to deal with the consequences. They were known as the Liquidators.
According to the Vyacheslav Grishin of the Chernobyl Union, 25,000 Russian
liquidators died and 70,000 were disabled.In Belarus, 10,000 died and 25,000 were
disabled. This totals to 60,000 deaths and 165,000 disabled. They were exposed to
high doses of radiation that cause almost all of these liquidators killed or disabled.
There were a few accidental casualties such as explosions and workers falling off of
buildings.

This accident described as one of the most frightening environmental disasters in

the world. We can take one of the voices from Chernobyl by Svetlana
Aleksievich,"Chernobyl is like a war of all wars. There's nowhere to hide. Not
underground, not underwater, not in the air". The workers suffered from one of the
diseases that was acute radiation sickness (ARS). The disaster in Chernobyl resulted
about 1/3 of the cases of ARS reported worldwide. The radiation causes cellular
degradation due to damage to DNA and other molecular structures within the cells.
Between 1986 and 2004, 985,000 people were killed as a result of radioactive
contamination.

“Valia Voronkova, a young Russian girl, lost her leg in the wake of the Chernobyl
disaster. On 26 April 1986, the fourth reactor at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant
exploded, spreading radioactivity across the Ukraine and Belarus.”
REFERENCES

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girl-lost-her-leg-in-the-wake-of-the-picture-id582869394

2) Tiffany Truong, Janelle Tomagan, Crystal Huong, David Bisares, retrieved from,
https://pubhealth168chernobyldisaster.weebly.com/

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https://www.greenfacts.org/en/chernobyl/index.htm#0

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